Nearly a year after the north suburban victims’ rights advocate filed an ethics complaint against Democratic state Sen. Ira Silverstein of Chicago alleging that he had a “twisted agenda” and pursued her romantically “with the intent to degrade” her when they worked together on a bill, her allegations made a big splash in Springfield.

She testified in an open hearing at the Capitol that Silverstein played frightening and unconscionable “mind games” with her.

Her complaint, amplified by being in the first wave of what now seems like a never-ending flood of sexual harassment and abuse accusations against powerful men, was widely covered.

Rotheimer provided reporters with a 444-page .pdf file of nearly 17 months of her Facebook message correspondence with Silverstein, and many media outlets, including the Tribune, published excerpts.

I read the entire file and had extensive conversations with her.

Rotheimer wanted to be taken seriously.

And she was.

Democrats stripped Silverstein of a nearly $21,000-a-year leadership position, a raft of challengers filed petitions to run against him in the March 20 primary and Special Legislative Inspector General Julie Porter launched an extensive investigation into her claims, including the damning allegation that Silverstein slow-walked the progress of the bill he was sponsoring on Rotheimer’s behalf in order to get more time to flirt with her.

Porter interviewed 20 witnesses — including, at length, Rotheimer and Silverstein — and pored over the voluminous documentary record in the case.

Nearly 13 pages of Porter’s 25-page report released to the public Thursday examine in granular detail the byzantine, fitful progress and ultimate failure of Senate Bill 2151, Rotheimer’s attempt to amend the Crime Victims Compensation Act to allow for reimbursement of related attorneys’ fees.

Much of the rest of the report applies scrutiny to the embarrassing but nonexplicit electronic communications between the two.

Rotheimer wanted to be vindicated.

And she was not.

Porter found that the repartee appeared mutually enjoyable, though it did show that Silverstein “did not maintain an appropriate professional distance from the proponent of a bill he was sponsoring” and thereby committed “conduct unbecoming of a legislator.”

He was never accused of making or even attempting to initiate sexual contact, and his actions did “not come close to meeting the standards that courts require to prove sexual harassment under Illinois and federal law,” she wrote.

Porter also concluded that Silverstein “earnestly and aggressively” tried to advance SB2151 despite strong opposition from other victims’ advocates, and that, if anything, “he kept going and going because he wanted to help, please and placate Rotheimer.”

Porter wrote that, “far from coming off as intimidating to Rotheimer, Silverstein appears overly eager to please her.”

That was my reading of the evidence when it first came to light late last year: A married lawmaker with a goofy, schoolboy crush on a single woman who needed his help, a woman who led him on by at least pretending to return his romantic interest.

Rotheimer angrily took issue with that assessment and told me many times that Silverstein disgusted her and that she only pretended to play along with him out of fear that he would abandon sponsorship of her bill.

Porter, smartly, declined to referee that claim.

“I take Rotheimer’s perspective on the Facebook exchanges seriously,” she wrote in what I believe to be the most important passage of her report. “I do not suggest that she is lying about how she felt and I do not conclude that she subjectively welcomed the communications” from Silverstein.

“Although Rotheimer’s subjective perspective is relevant, it is also critical to assess the evidence objectively,” Porter wrote. “My objective assessment is that even if Rotheimer was internally cringing at the messages Silverstein sent her and did not welcome them, she gave no outward sign of that (at) all, and no one — including Silverstein — would have had any way of knowing that she was not a fully willing participant in the discussions.”

This is fair. Subjective experiences matter in cases of alleged sexual harassment, but absent other evidence they can’t be considered dispositive. Feelings are not facts. Intentions matter.

And although Silverstein’s intentions were pretty clearly unwholesome — Porter scoffed in her report at his “denial of any sexual connotations at all to the messages” when she interviewed him — as well as unbecoming a legislator, they were not, by any objective standard, sinister or predatory.

Rotheimer ripped Porter’s investigation as “pathetic” and “incomplete” in a conversation with me Friday morning. In short conversations with Silverstein Thursday and Friday, he told me he was “not going to argue” with Porter’s conclusions, which included the observation that “he does not appear fully to accept that the (Facebook) messages went beyond ‘joking around.’”

Does he want to offer anyone an apology? “I don’t want to answer that,” he said. “I wouldn’t do what I did again, but I’m moving on.”

Rotheimer wanted Silverstein held accountable.

And he has been.

In her testimony in Springfield last fall, Rotheimer demanded Silverstein “answer for” his behavior with her, and although he has said precious little and will not be sanctioned, circumstances have punished him.

The investigatory findings cleared him of the most serious allegations, but Silverstein’s early refusal to defend himself in public gave significant traction to those who are aiming to end his political career. One challenger in particular, Ram Villivalam, has racked up a gaudy list of endorsements from prominent Democrats and labor leaders who would otherwise be expected to endorse the incumbent.

Further, Silverstein is awaiting a ruling on a challenge to his nominating petitions, which at last count were 45 signatures short of making him eligible to be on the ballot. He told me this problem was unrelated to his high-profile difficulties and that his campaign is going well.

Whether or not he’s re-elected, his reputation has suffered a major blow. Those excruciating Facebook messages will never go away.

What has not been harmed here, however, is the idea that women who feel sexually harassed should get a fair hearing. The thoroughness of Porter’s investigation should be a model for how all such complaints are handled in the future.

Re:Tweets

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